The electronic equipment in general, particularly computers, including the portable ones, such as laptops and notebooks, include electronic components, such as microprocessors and integrated circuits which, to properly function, require that their temperature be maintained within a certain temperature range, and which also guarantees the maintenance of the operational features of these electronic components.
Due to the technological advances, mainly regarding the processing speed of these electronic components, problems, such as superheating and heat dissipation in equipment using such electronic components, have been more and more a limitation factor for the good performance of these electronic components and represent one of the great obstacles to the improvement of such equipment. Besides the processors, the integrated circuits of the computers also require an acceptable temperature range, beyond which the operation of said integrated circuits and of the other circuits coupled thereto, can be compromised, causing operation failures. A high temperature in computers may also be a risk of injury for the user.
Traditional refrigeration systems (radiation or convection) do not provide an efficient refrigeration of the more sensitive electronic components.
The increase of heat generation of electronic components in computers is generally accompanied by a greater demand of the refrigeration system to dissipate this heat. In the case of portable computers, generally presenting a screen element coupled to a base in which are mounted the electronic circuits, keyboards, cable connection terminals, the relatively reduced size of the computers makes difficult, not only the heat dissipation, but also the use of refrigeration systems which require a larger installation space, usually not available in this type of computers.
As a consequence of these inconveniences, the electronic equipment industry has adopted refrigeration solutions for computers, such as those discussed in U.S. Patents and U.S. Patent Applications U.S. Pat. No. 4,434,625, U.S. Pat. No. 5,365,749, US2005/0123418, U.S. Pat. No. 5,969,939, U.S. Pat. No. 6,181,553, U.S. Pat. No. 6,415,612, U.S. Pat. No. 6,628,520, U.S. Pat. No. 6,687,123, U.S. Pat. No. 6,826,047 and U.S. Pat. No. 6,950,303, none of them being applicable to portable computers, i.e., with reduced dimensions, and more disclosing a refrigeration system utilizing a phase change refrigerant fluid as a cooling means of a forced-air flow to be directed to the electronic components to be cooled.
In addition to these solutions, document U.S. Pat. No. 6,837,057 presents a refrigeration system mounted in a docking station and using a thermoelectric element for cooling a forced-air flow to be directed to the electronic components of a computer coupled to the docking station. in this previous solution, the forced-air flow is blown by a fan and caused to pass through a cool face of a thermoelectric element, to be cooled and directed to the base of the docked computer and a forced-air flow is passed through a heating face of this thermoelectric element and directed away from the computer. In this prior art solution, the cooled air is directed, from the cool face of the thermoelectric element to the base of the computer, through a duct provided in the docking station.
Despite improving the cooling efficiency of the portable computers, without requiring increasing the dimensions, weight and power supply thereof, such prior art solution presents the drawback of low heat exchange efficiency and applicability limitations.